


Progress

by lionessvalenti



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Aftermath of Violence, Comfort Sex, Coping, M/M, aftermath of imprisonment
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-15
Updated: 2020-05-15
Packaged: 2021-03-03 02:28:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24197500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lionessvalenti/pseuds/lionessvalenti
Summary: Bucky and Loki come home after five months of imprisonment on an alien planet. Things are different.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Loki
Comments: 6
Kudos: 49
Collections: Hurt Comfort Exchange 2020





	Progress

**Author's Note:**

  * For [aurilly](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aurilly/gifts).



Bucky stayed next to Loki for the entire flight back to Earth. He knew that Thor was saying things, telling them what they had done to find them, to get them freed, and sometimes Loki spoke back to him in short, sarcastic sentences. Bucky was aware of it, but he didn't hear a word. None of it felt real until they touched the ground.

"This isn't New Asgard," Bucky said as he stepped off the jet. He recognized the mountains and plains of Wakanda, but it wasn't what he had expected.

Thor placed a hand on Bucky's shoulder. "You'll both find top notch medical care here. You're malnourished and need to be seen to." He spoke slowly, as if he had already explained this, and he probably had. The last forty-eight hours had been a daze. Everything that wasn't prison was a dream.

After a hot meal, a long shower and some work with a detangling brush, Bucky went to Shuri's lab.

"Bucky!" She ran to him and pulled him into a fierce embrace. It had been several years since he'd seen her in person, since he'd left Wakanda for New Asgard. But she was familiar, and he needed familiar. It was the first thing that didn't feel completely surreal.

"It's good to see you," he said, wrapping his arm around her.

She looked up at him. "You know, it scares a lot of people when you go off the grid like that."

"It scares me too." He took a step back and pulled a plastic covering off his left shoulder. "I didn't let it get wet, since there's still some electrical parts in there. But it's filthy."

Shuri smiled warmly. "I love dirty electrical parts. Sit."

There wasn't a place for small talk, Bucky found after he settled on the examination table. "Have you seen Loki?"

"Yes. He was in here earlier." She didn't look up from her work, inspecting the damage done to what was left of the arm. It had been chopped off as close to Bucky's flesh as they could get it. "He asked after you as well."

"Did he seem okay?"

"I don't know. It was the first time I've ever met him, so I'm not the best judge. I was just checking his vitals. He was mostly quiet." She poked the inside of his arm. "How on earth did they cut through the vibranium?"

"Trial and error," Bucky said. "It took them eighteen tries. Different blades, different methods. They all sparked and smoked. I tried to explain that if they gave me back my kimoyo beads I could remove it for them, but they didn't listen. Or they didn't understand."

He hadn't expected them to do it. He remembered the way HYDRA soldiers had sawed his crushed arm off at the elbow right there in the snow. There was no anesthesia, no painkillers. It was blood and pain, and they dragged him off afterwards to get the rest of his arm cut off. It was healthy, the upper part of his arm, but the one they had built didn't fit over it. So they used a power saw to get rid of it. Bucky could still smell his burning flesh. He smelled it every time they tried to cut through the vibranium.

Some people didn't care if they made others suffer. He knew that better than most.

"Was it awful? Being captured, I mean." Shuri had stopped inspecting the dirty socket and was looking up at Bucky with concern. "You don't have to tell me."

Bucky swallowed. "We made the best of it that we could."

She nodded. "You made it home mostly in one piece."

"The piece I'm missing is at least the replaceable one." Bucky flashed her a grin. It wasn't completely genuine, but it seemed to put her at ease. Yes, he had been imprisoned on an alien planet for five months, but he was the same old Bucky. He wasn't irrevocably changed by the experience. He could still joke about his prosthetic limb and smile and laugh.

He could pretend the act was for her, but it was also for himself. He could go back.

Shuri removed what remained of Bucky's arm with a simple command from her kimoyo beads. His shoulder was red and swollen from the repeated irritation, and she covered it up with bandages. 

"Just for a few days," she said.

After he finished up with Shuri, Bucky took the train into the city. He had a house here once, but left it when he moved to New Asgard. Someone else lived there now. He would be staying in the palace until his new arm was ready. It was nice, but it didn't feel like home.

Bucky walked through the palace to the hall of guest apartments and stopped in his tracks when he saw Loki sitting on the floor outside his door. "Hi."

Loki looked up and slid up the wall to his feet. "Hi."

If Bucky hadn't been so intimately familiar with Loki at this point, he might not have recognized him. Loki was dressed in some strikingly casual clothes: loose fitting linen pants and a tight fitting long-sleeved black shirt, but most distressingly, his hair had been cut off completely. Bucky knew Loki's hair had been knotted and unkempt, but so had his own, and a haircut wasn't a plunge Bucky had needed to take.

"Your hair," Bucky said, taking a few steps closer to him.

"Yes." Loki ran a self-conscious hand through it. Between the motion and the shorter hair, he looked quite boyish and young. "It was either have my scalp pulled at for an hour or cut it off. I'd been through enough pain. It will grow back."

"It looks nice." Bucky wasn't sure what he was supposed to do with his hand. Unfortunately, the robes he'd been given didn't have a pocket. "Are you heading back to New Asgard?"

Loki rolled his eyes. "That's what Thor is telling me to do. There are these foolish restrictions on where I can go while on Midgard, but Wakanda is not one of them. I could -- I could stay. Unless you'd rather I didn't, in which case, I'd prefer to leave, really--"

"I want you to stay," Bucky said before Loki could completely backtrack his way out of his own offer. Finally sure of what to do, he took Loki's hand in his own. "I wouldn't have made it without you."

"You would have," Loki said, much to Bucky's surprise. Loki loved adoration and being credited with things, regardless of whether or not he had earned them. "You and I are survivors. We do what we must to keep going."

Bucky shook his head. "I don't know if I'm a survivor or a guy that's just really hard to kill."

"Is that not the same thing?"

Bucky didn't have a response to that. He didn't know what to say at all.

It had been a routine supply run. There were things Asgardians were used to that they couldn't get on Earth, so they still did some intergalactic trading. Bucky and Loki had made this run twenty times already. It was _their_ route. Bucky looked forward to those trips more than anything. Loki was snippy and abrasive, uptight and calculating, and funny and gorgeous. Bucky loved discovering new layers of him with each run.

It wasn't theirs anymore. Even if they went back, it would be tainted. It was stolen from them, just like their goods, just like Bucky's arm. Bucky learned that Loki got cold and quiet when he was angry, and while he never knew what to say when Bucky suffered breakdowns after each attempt to remove his arm, Loki would hold him nonetheless.

"Show me to your room," Loki said, when Bucky said nothing.

Bucky nodded. He unlocked the door and they stumbled into the apartment together. Loki brought his hand to Bucky's cheek and drew him in close for a kiss.

"Oh, we're doing this," Bucky breathed. 

Loki's eyes widened. "Did you not want to? I thought--"

"I want to," Bucky said quickly. "But it's not like we ever discussed it."

In the darkness, their hands had found each other. As the days blended together into weeks and months, until they were no longer counting, Bucky gave more and more himself to Loki. There wasn't any other release. It was desperation. It kept them grounded.

"Did you want to discuss it now?" Loki asked.

Bucky pulled him down onto the bed. It was soft. It was too soft to sleep on after the stone floor they had called a bed, but it was perfect to drown in while Loki fucked him into oblivion. "No. I do not."

They pulled off each other's clothes, shedding each layer carefully. They had fucked in the cover of darkness. Now, the sun shone bright through the windows. It was as if they were seeing each other for the first time.

Loki caught sight of the bandages around Bucky's arm, he touched gingerly at the edges. "Is it worse or better now?"

"It's progress," Bucky replied. He didn't want to talk about it. He ducked his head down and brought Loki's cock into his mouth. Loki moaned, grabbing Bucky's hair. He thrust his hips forward and Bucky all but gagged around his dick. He didn't care.

It was no longer desperation. It was want. It was a celebration. It was whatever they wanted it to be. They made the rules now.

That was progress, too.


End file.
